


A Timely Christmas

by alexcat



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: 1872 (Marvel), Christmas, Drunk Tony Stark, First Kiss, M/M, Timely
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:20:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28433784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alexcat/pseuds/alexcat
Summary: The sheriff hauls a drunk Tony into his jail on Christmas Eve. Things go a little different than he thought they would.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 6
Kudos: 42
Collections: 2020 Captain America/Iron Man Holiday Exchange





	A Timely Christmas

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cap Iron Man Community](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Cap+Iron+Man+Community).



> A fill for the following 2020 Holidays Exchange: Community Exchange: _Blacksmith Tony Stark gets arrested and detained overnight for public drunkenness by Sheriff Steve Rogers on Christmas Eve._

“Come on, Sheriff! It’s Christmas Eve!” Stark said, slurring his words a little too much to convince Sheriff Rogers that he was sober enough to leave alone. 

Rogers had hauled him out of the saloon before he could manage to get his ass beat for being too damned outspoken about the governor and the mayor. Stark was really good at that. 

The sheriff wasn’t sure why it bothered him so much, the thought of Stark getting hurt, He tried to tell himself it was just him doing his duty. 

But it wasn’t. 

When he slept at night, he dreamed of those eyes. They weren’t quite as bloodshot in his dreams as they were right now. He also dreamed of that damned mouth, usually doing things to him that he dare not think about when he was awake. 

Right now, he needed to get the idiot locked up before Fisk and his henchmen decided to hurt Stark. One of these days, it would happen and they’d kill him dead. But not tonight, not if he could help it. 

“Just sleep it off in the cell, Stark. Fisk can’t get to you there and you might just shut the hell up for once.” 

Stark grinned and Rogers’ belly did a flipflop inside him. 

“Make me.” 

Rogers sighed. He really wasn’t up for manhandling anyone tonight. He’d hoped to have a quiet dinner and maybe write a letter to his ma back in New York. He wondered if it was snowing back there. He hoped Ma had enough wood to stay warm. 

“Come on, Stark. Come upstairs with me. I’ll make you some coffee and we’ll get some food in you, sober you up a bit.” 

“If I wanted to be sober, I’d be sober, you idiot!” Tony shouted at him. 

Steve put his hands up. “Now, calm the hell down, Stark. I don’t aim to harm you. I’m just trying to help.” 

“Then let me go. There’s a bottle of whiskey with my name on it down at the saloon.”

“You drained that one and they ain’t givin’ you any more tonight.”

“Well, maybe I was gonna bed that pretty new girl, Wanda.” 

“You’re too drunk to bed anyone right now. Besides, I ain’t never seen you head up the stairs with any of the girls there.” 

“You watching to see who I bed?” 

Rogers’ blushed at Stark’s question. He had actually paid attention to see if the blacksmith ever left with anyone. So far, he’d never seen him with anyone at all, except his bottle of liquor. 

“Maybe,” he finally answered. 

Stark clamped his mouth shut at Rogers’ answer.

Sheriff Rogers held his hands out. “Listen, it’s Christmas Eve. I’ve got a little cake leftover from a package from New York and some good strong coffee. Let’s eat some cake and celebrate the season peacefully.” 

“All right, but I don’t mean to sleep in the damn jail tonight. So let’s get this done and I’ll go home.”

“You’re stayin’ here. Let me get that cake.”

He left Stark in the cell, but the door wasn’t locked. He fully expected his prisoner to be gone when he came back, but he was heating the coffee in the kettle on the stove in the corner. 

“Thought I’d get that coffee started. Why the hell are you here in this godforsaken town, Rogers?” Stark looked over his shoulder at Steve. 

“I don’t really know. I just drifted this way after the war. Not much for me back in New York.” 

Rogers had plates, forks, and a small cake when he came down the stairs. He put them on his desk and grabbed the tin cups he used for coffee. Stark poured the strong brew and sat to eat. 

“Why are you here?” Steve asked him. 

“I suspect you already know,” Stark said, eyeing him. “Everybody knows what I was, what I did. I was stupid enough to think that making better weapons would make wars end with less killing, not more.”

“That why you drink so much?” 

Stark nodded. “Mostly. It makes me forget, makes me pass out so I don’t have to worry about falling asleep and seeing all those bodies on the battlefield.” He wiped his brow. 

Steve reached over and put a hand on his arm. He didn’t say anything, just squeezed it as reassuringly as he knew how. 

“I wonder if my ma has a Christmas tree. The last Christmas I was home, she had one. It had popcorn strung on strings and some kind of little wax angels she said came all the way from Germany. She had to have gone hungry to buy that stuff. Ma always did love a chance to make things and to cook special food,” Steve remembered. 

“My folks died when I was young, in my early twenties. My friend, Jim Rhodes, and I moved in together. I spent time with his family at the holidays.”

“I – I have a tree upstairs if you wanna see it,” Steve admitted, almost embarrassed by his admission. 

Stark grinned. “I might still be a little too tipsy to go up all those steps without help.” 

Was he flirting? Steve wondered. “Come on, then.” He stood and so did Stark. Steve put his arm around Stark’s waist. They walked slowly up the steps to the sheriff’s living quarters. His quarters were fairly plain – a table, two chairs, a stove and a small bookshelf. In one corner sat a little evergreen tree with strings of popcorn on it and a little tin star on top. 

“I like it,” Stark said quietly. 

Steve looked at him. He looked sad and wistful at the same time. Steve realized he still had his arm around Stark and, for some reason that he couldn’t name, he pulled Stark a little closer. He’d have kissed his cheek if Stark hadn’t spoken again. 

“My fiancé loved Christmas trees. Her family had the first one I ever saw.” 

“Did you marry?” 

“No, I ran out and came west. I – well, you know the story.” 

“You’re welcome to stay up here tonight. I’ll sleep downstairs,” Steve told him, feeling oddly tender toward the other man. 

“I don’t mind sleeping in the cell, Steve. I just like to ride your ass sometimes.”

Steve tried not to think of the image that popped into his mind at Tony’s words. He had lied when he said he drifted west. He had come west to outrun his past. No one wanted a man around who liked the company of other men as much as he did women. He had fallen in love with another soldier and they’d been seen together by the man’s jealous former fiancée. He had not touched another human in any intimate way since he’d been drummed out of the Army. He hadn’t wanted to.

Until now. 

“You could stay up here with me,” Steve blurted out and immediately wished he could take it back. 

Tony raised an eyebrow. “I’m not too drunk to know what you mean, I don’t think. Are you sure that you mean that?” 

“I think I do,” Steve answered, his voice low. “Maybe we take this slow though. I don’t want to cause you more trouble. People don’t take this sort of thing lightly.”

“Sheriff Rogers, they’re going to kill us both eventually, I expect. This town is a bad place and I don’t think anything either of us does will change that. Maybe we should take our joy where we find it.” 

Steve leaned toward Tony and kissed his lips softly. He tasted of whiskey, but the taste wasn’t unpleasant. They turned to face one another and embraced as they kissed again. Steve found himself leaning into the shorter man. 

“You can stay up here with me, but let’s wait until you’re sober before we – uh, before we go farther,” Steve said, between kisses. 

“You think we can stay in the same bed and wait?” Tony asked, a wicked twinkle in his blue eyes. 

Steve rubbed his face over the stubble on Stark’s chin. “We can try. Maybe it’s how we could bring in the New Year instead.” 

“In that case, Merry Christmas,” Tony said with a smile and another kiss.


End file.
